


I Saw Daddy Shooting Santa Claus

by achillese



Category: Supernatural, Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Apocalypse, Christmas, Crossover, Family, Gen, Mild Gore, Mild Language, Survival, Zombies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-27
Updated: 2011-12-27
Packaged: 2017-10-28 06:46:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/304920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/achillese/pseuds/achillese
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John, while searching for Sam and Dean amidst the walker apocalypse, runs into a new group of survivors along the way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Saw Daddy Shooting Santa Claus

**Author's Note:**

> Written as part of a Secret Santa gift exchange on Tumblr.

“You wanna point that thing somewhere else, son?”

“Like hell I will. You first, grandpa.”

John cocked the hammer of the pistol he carried, clearly unfazed by the stranger’s words. He aimed at the young stranger’s forehead, both eyes open, hand never quivering for an instant. “You don’t wanna test me, boy, you really don’t.”

“Yeah? You and what army?”

“Ain’t got one. This is a one-man army and you’re in my way.”

“How do I know you’re not one of them? Been bit?”

“I could say the same about you.”

The younger man, the one pointing the crossbow at the space between John Winchester’s eyes, made a gruff little noise of annoyance. “Seems we’re at a stalemate.”

“That it does.”

“So what’re we gonna do about it?”

John chuckled without humor, though admittedly he was somewhat amused by this back-and-forth banter. It’s not like he’s had much human contact in the past few weeks, so even this mildly threatening situation was starting to feel welcoming. He was used to this, to the suspicion and the warlike atmosphere, to the way the air was dense as glue around him as the world outside slowly unthreaded itself and fell apart.

His grip on the gun didn’t loosen. “I could always just shoot you.”

The young man’s nostrils flared. “You could. ‘Cept I got people with me, and if I don’t come back, they’re gonna come after you, I can promise you that.”

The hardened look in John’s eyes began to ease up. “People? How many?”

“More’n ten, I’ll tell you that. Your ass’ll be toast, old man.”

“You got any younger boys with you? They’d be in their early to mid-twenties.”

“Why? You checkin’ the market or somethin’?”

“I’m looking for my sons.” John made an attempt to keep the desperation out of his voice. If this man – whoever the hell he was – was telling the truth and he was part of a group, he had to know if Sam and Dean were with them. It was a long shot with impossible odds but John had to be completely sure. What else was hoping for?

At the mention of sons, the young man lowered his crossbow ever so slightly; it was only thanks to John’s Marine-trained eyes that he caught the motion at all.

“Lookin’ for family, huh?” The words came out of the man’s mouth like venom.

“Yeah, that’s right. That’s the only thing left worth fighting for in this world, am I right?”

“Damn straight.”

John chanced a tiny half smile at the man. “So. Got anyone in that age range?”

The man shook his head and for a moment John could swear he actually saw a little bit of regret in the movement. “No. Sorry. We got one but he’s an Asian. Don’t think he’s your son, unless you adopted.”

John sighed and loosened his grip on the gun. It was always a long shot. He didn’t feel so disappointed. After all, the chances of Sam and Dean being here, now...it was too much to ask for. Since when did the world work in John Winchester’s favor, anyway?

The man seemed to understand his thought process because he said, “If you want, you can come with. Camp’s about a mile or so back. You can rest up for the night. Looks like it’s about to get dark, and this is a dangerous area on your own.”

John raised an eyebrow as the man began to lower his crossbow at last, but he didn’t lower his own gun until he was absolutely certain he wasn’t about to get shot with an arrow; the man slung the crossbow over his back, almost as a means of signifying truce.

He started to walk towards John with both hands in the air in surrender. “I ain’t bit. You can check if you want.”

“And you trust that I’m not?” John regarded the man’s lack of defensive posture with a slight air of disapproval. It was almost father-like, in a way. If he ever caught Sam or Dean lowering their guard like this guy—

“Even if you are, I’m safe from you. Had my friend Rick trainin’ his gun on you this whole time.”

Behind John, a twig snapped; the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. How was it that he’d been followed this whole time and he hadn’t noticed it, hadn’t sensed it? Damn him, he was getting careless in his old age.

The man smiled at the surprised flicker in John’s eyes, but the motion wasn’t unkind, more like amused and slightly sympathetic. “Come on, old man. We’ll lead you back to camp so you can rest easy.”

“Easy’s not exactly the word I’d use in these times, but at this point I’ll take what I can get.” John lowered his weapon at last, cautiously approaching the boy in case his invisible friend Rick thought he was a threat and shot at him. “What’s your name, son?”

“Daryl. And yours?”

“I’m John.”

“Well hi there, John. Merry Christmas.”

“Sure as hell doesn’t feel like Christmas. In this weather?”

“That’s the South for you. Welcome aboard.”

\---

“So you’ve been out here for how long, looking for this girl?” John asked as he, Daryl, and Rick made their way back to camp (or, as Rick had corrected the younger man, the ‘farm.’ God love America’s farmers).

“A week so far. Been nothing but dead ends and cold trails from here to the edges of Bumfuck. But we’re not stopping,” Daryl added. “She could be out there waiting for us to find her.”

“She’s only twelve,” Rick jumped in. “She won’t be able to survive out here forever on her own.”

John nodded in agreement, though his mind was wandering elsewhere. It was an interesting dynamic, with these three men here and now. All leaders in their own way, all used to keeping the peace and safeguarding those in their care. Rick was a Sheriff’s Deputy and damn if he didn’t use every bit of his calmness and experience in his former work to keep everyone else in line, keep everyone else sane and surviving. Daryl, though a younger brother and not exactly a model or levelheaded citizen, turned out to be just as responsible as any of them, personally shouldering the burden of finding the missing girl Sophia, treating her like she was family. Though, in their own twisted little way, that’s what this was, wasn’t it? A ramshackle family built on the ashes of the rest of the world.

The sun was beginning to set over the horizon when the three men all stopped at the same time as they heard it: footsteps. Twigs breaking, branches snapping, leaves crackling under footfalls. As if on instinct, Daryl shouldered his crossbow and notched an arrow while Rick pulled out his shotgun. John adjusted the rifle he had slung across his back but didn’t make a move to pull it. Not yet. He could hear something else, something the other two men might not have picked up.

Panicked breathing. Quickened steps. Muffled footfalls. Small.

Tiny. Quiet. Fast.

Too fast.

“It’s not a walker,” John hissed under his breath. “Listen. It’s running. Walkers don’t run.”

They stopped and listened, and it was as if Time itself decided to pause for them. They could hear every noise in the forest, every cricket, every flutter of a wing, and yes, even the small footsteps rapidly approaching their direction.

“Do you think…?” Daryl trailed off, looking over his shoulder at Rick.

“Let’s not jump the gun,” Rick warned with his eyes trained straight ahead like a hunting hound. “It could be a kid walker.”

“John’s right though. I mean, I’ve never come across one that’s run before.”

“Yeah, well, there was a time when we didn’t have to deal with walkers before either, but that obviously changed, didn’t it?”

Rick’s words weren’t unkind but Daryl’s gaze still hardened and his grip on the crossbow seemed to tighten. John rested a hand on the younger man’s arm, steadying him.

“Don’t get overexcited,” he reminded. “You might be shooting at a victim here. Just stay calm, stay rational, and stay alert.”

“I don’t look calm to you?” Daryl asked as a bead of sweat ran down the length of his face.

John blinked. “If calm were a synonym for anxious, boy, you’d be on all types of meds right now.”

Just then a small figure burst forth through the bushes about thirty yards away from them.

Daryl immediately fell to one knee, aiming his crossbow. “Sophia, drop!”

“That’s—?”

John watched as the little blonde-haired girl who’d erupted from the bushes dropped to the forest floor, face streaked with dirt and tears and blood but very much alive and very much human. Behind her were three walkers all ambling along at a leisurely pace that began to quicken once they spotted the three men in addition to Sophia, their original prey.

Daryl wasted no time in letting his arrow fly, spearing the closest walker right through the eye socket. John stared, impressed, as the thing crumpled to the ground before them, just feet away from where Sophia was lying with her hands over her head.

The sight of the girl pushed John into action. He took aim and fired three times at the second walker while next to him Rick shot at the third and final one.

The one John shot, God rest his soul, was a fat one and dressed up as a supermarket Santa Claus with the red and white get-up, the fake beard long gone and the white trim ripped and covered with dried blood. His face was gruesome, with his jaw missing and black blood just dripping from the open orifice. That’s _one_ way to ruin some poor kid’s Christmas and traumatize him for life: walker Santa.

Both walkers went down, bleeding into the forest floor, the sounds of the gunshots echoing throughout the forest.

Daryl ran from his spot where he’d been crouched and slung his crossbow over his shoulder before kneeling next to Sophia, pushing her grimy hair away from her forehead as she finally looked up at him. She stared at him as though she’d never seen a human being before, though considering she’d been missing for a week and the only ‘living’ things she came into contact with were walkers, that was probably a pretty accurate guess.

Daryl grinned down at her, relieved to see that though she was shaken up beyond a reasonable doubt, she was alive. Unbitten. Human.

“Been lookin’ for you everywhere, girl,” Daryl said with a small chuckle.

Sophia pushed herself up onto her knees and threw her skinny arms around his neck, whimpering and making incoherent sounds of relief. Rick and John stood a little ways behind the two, eyeing the scene with slight satisfaction. But when Rick turned to look at John, the newcomer had something else in his eyes

“That wouldn’t be remorse I see, would it?” Rick asked under his breath, not quite loud enough for Daryl or Sophia to overhear.

“Might be. Might not.”

“I heard you talking to Daryl. About finding your sons.”

“Your point?”

“Don’t give up.”

John looked at the former sheriff. “I never said I was.”

Rick shrugged. “Just looked like it for a moment there. I coulda sworn...” He trailed off and shook his head. “You know, I was separated from my wife and son when this all started. Woke up in the hospital after a coma with no one in sight. Well, no one living anyway.” He gave a halfhearted chuckle. “But I knew – I just knew – they were still out there. I could feel it. It kept me going, kept me strong and fighting and pushing against all the other shit that kept getting thrown my way. Even Daryl there. He never gave up on Sophia. They’re not family – not by blood, anyway – but he knew she wasn’t dead. He just knew it. And he kept fighting.” He paused. “As far as I’m concerned, you’re still fighting. That’s a giveaway that they’re still out there. If they weren’t, you’d feel it.”

Before John could respond, Daryl called out to them: “Either one of y’all know if there’s such a thing as a Winchester .31? Or a Winchester .83? Or an Ambrose?”

John’s ears prickled as Rick responded, “Don’t think so. But Ambrose is a town not too far from here. Why d’you ask?”

Daryl reached around Sophia and ripped what looked like a piece of flimsy pink construction paper that had been pinned to the fabric of her jacket. “It’s here.”

The two men ambled over with curious expressions on their faces as they stared down at the paper. In fading black marker it was written: **Winchester 31 83 Ambrose**.

31 and 83.

Coordinates. Latitude and longitude.

“That’s not a gun type. That’s a name. Winchester’s me,” John breathed. “My surname.” He looked at Sophia. “Where’d you get that?”

Sophia furrowed her eyebrows, trying to answer John’s question and calm herself down at the same time. “They…they pinned it on me.”

“Who did?”

“The boys. The ones holed up in this apartment building. I...they sheltered me before I told them I had to get back to you guys. And before I left they pinned it on me. Said...said in case I ran into anyone else along the way, to pass on the message.”

“What message?”

“That...that they’re ‘Fighting, surviving, hoping, and waiting.’” She recited it as if she’d done this a dozen times before sleeping at night, saying the words over and over again as though they were her only lifeline, as though they were helping her to do the same thing.

But they were waiting. Waiting for what? For John? He’d come. Hell, he’d fight off every walker from here to Timbuktu to get to his boys. And like Rick had said, Ambrose wasn’t too far from here. Sure he’d have to rest up for the night, probably make camp with Daryl and Rick’s people, but once dawn broke he’d be on his way to Sam and Dean.

Daryl didn’t quite understand the softened look on John’s face, but Rick did, clapping him on the shoulder with a small smile of his own gracing his weathered face. “See? What’d I tell you? You’re still fighting, and so are they.” He chuckled and squeezed John’s shoulder. “Merry Christmas, John.”


End file.
